Meet the German Referee Marco Fritz who saved Taiwo Awoniyi’s life
Tragedy almost befell Nigeria and World of football but for the timely intervention of German Referee Marco Fritz who came to Taiwo Awoniyi’s aid.
Taiwo Awoniyi, on loan at Mainz 05 from Liverpool was saved from life threatening incident during a German Bundesliga match between his side and Augsburg on Sunday.
Although the club have confirmed that he is fine and the player also confirmed that he is stable, this may not have been the case if not for the first aid treatment Taiwo Awoniyi received from referee Marco Fritz.
The incident occurred in the 23rd minute of the game when Taiwo Awoniyi collided with Augsburg defender Felix Uduokhai who is of Nigerian descent but born in Germany.
Taiwo Awoniyi’s case would have just been another case of death on the pitch but Marco Fritz performed a first aid on him before he was attended to by the medics and taken to the hospital.
With the incident that happened in the Nigeria Professional Football League few months back when Chieneme Martins, Nasarawa United player, slumped, and died during a match.
Although, Taiwo Awoniyi’s case was that of concussion and Chieneme Martins a different case, regardless of the differences in the situations, if Marco Fritz did not help we could have lost him.
Maybe the League Management Company, and the Nigeria Referees Association can organize workshops for Nigerian referees before start of any league season.
